Verdict Postponed for 2 Citibank Officers Linked to Malinda Dee

The South Jakarta District Court has delayed its verdict on two former Citibank Indonesia employees who are suspects in a case involving graft convict Inong Malinda Dee’s banking crimes.

The two employees, cash officer Novianty Iriane and cash supervisor Betharia Panjaitan, are alleged to have aided Malinda in siphoning off billions of rupiah from some of Citibank Indonesia’s wealthiest customers.

“The panel of judges is not ready. There are several decisions to be resolved first,” said Chief Justice Suko Harsono on Monday.

Suko said the panel would read out the verdicts on July 5.

Prosecutors have demanded that Betharia and Novianty each be sentenced to eight years in prison and fined Rp 10 billion ($1.06 million) or face an extra six months in jail.

Both defendants allegedly accepted transfer requests from Malinda, a former relationship manager at the bank who moved clients’ money to a web of bank accounts, including some owned by her relatives, without her clients’ permission or knowledge.

Malinda was not authorized to process transfers in excess of Rp 300 million, and thus had to submit the requests to Novianty, who then forwarded them to Betharia.

In handling the transfer forms, they allegedly did not verify the customers’ signatures, some which were forged by Malinda.

Novianty allegedly transferred money from high-worth Citibank customers as many as 43 times, in both dollar and rupiah amounts. Prosecutors allege that 24 of the transfers had a total value of $1.076 million and 19 transactions were valued at Rp 4.6 billion in total.

Betharia is accused of making 19 unauthorized transfers, five of which were valued at $115,000 in total and 14 of which totaled Rp 6.5 billion.

In March, Malinda was sentenced to eight years in prison for skimming about Rp 45.8 billion from 37 accounts between January 2007 and February 2011.

Dwi Herawati, a Citibank teller, was found guilty of charges similar to those brought against Novianty and Betharia, and sentenced to five years in prison earlier this month.